Chapter Seven: Far Reaching.
The sun set on New Krypton, marking the beginning of a brand new day. A brand new day ripe with possibilities; it was difficult to tell what this day would bring. Regardless, if anything was for certain, the opportunities for this day would be ripe and there would be many things that could be done with this brand new day. Excitement burst from those who stood on the planet of New Krypton.
"Everything is up and running as it should be," Karen announced to Faora, Kara, and Harry with a smile. "Mongul is lost in space but he might be back to reclaim his War World."
"War World is secured by us, we have a small security force, along with a few surprises," Faora remarked as she watched the group with a smile. She did spend a lot of time scouring the universe for another Kara over the past few weeks but so far no dice. She was sure that the opportunity would present itself sooner rather than later.
"Do you think that people will have a problem that we're a new planet with a high level weapon?" Harry asked, and Faora just sighed.
"Earthlings and their paranoia."
She shook her head and smiled for a brief moment before she said the rest of her piece.
"Let them have their problem. All we should concern ourselves with is the securing of New Krypton."
"Absolutely," Harry agreed, he wanted to be the one who brought that point out there for the sake of clarity.
"Things have been quiet from Earth," Kara stated as she sighed. "Which might be a good thing, as there might not have been any problems where we needed to bail people out any time soon. That isn't a bad thing per say, that's a good thing. A very good thing actually, and let's hope it stays that way.
There was a blinking beacon on the screen that caught their attention.
'Or perhaps you spoke just a bit prematurely,' Galatea thought through the mental link.
Kara turned her head around and scrambled towards the console. She wanted to know what this was all about so she punched up the console to figure out what was on the other end. The blonde offered a smile as she continued to click through the console and the image of her cousin flickered to life on the screen.
"Hey, Kal," Kara responded, as she dreaded what was going to come. It was all that possible, but not very likely, that he was calling for a friendly chat, just to check up on how they were all doing and all that. The blonde hoped for that even though a part of her really knew better than to hope for something like that.
"Kara, there's a situation, you and Harry should….well seeing is believing," Clark stated as he let in a deep breath and let it out as he decided that there was no point in stalling.
"Well then we better see it then," Harry responded, hoping for the best, although to be honest, he expected the worst.
There was a moment of pause where the link to what was going on Earth was patched through the portal.
"All hail are new saviors, of humankind, and finally we have a group that doesn't go through the backdoor and try to invade us but extends the helping hand to us and shares in their technology. G. Gordon Godfrey is here and I have to say, it's refreshing, refreshing to have a group that doesn't go in the backway, under an assumed identity, but rather they go face to face with us, as the Reach do."
"The Reach," Faora stated, her eyes flashing with anger.
The Reach tried to destabilize New Krypton from the onset and now that they were on Earth.
Jade, having heard the news, popped up and watched them, an angry expression spreading across her eyes.
"Surely, they know that the Guardians have forbidden them to do such a thing, to take over a planet that is under the control of a Green Lantern," Jade stated but Hal Jordan popped up.
"Actually, the Reach can come on a planet if they are invited and they have been invited," Hal Jordan responded in a grim voice. "The United Nations threw the doors open for them and….we can't do anything to interfere."
"Well anything by the book anyway," Faora commented as she crossed her arms and scowled, none of this really going her way.
"And furthermore there is a new planet that is our near neighbor that is causing us grief and could be a threat to the world."
Kara, Karen, Faora, and Harry all exchanged tense looks, not able to concentrate for a moment.
"Oh boy, here we go," Karen muttered, biting down her lip, she was a bundle of nerves and her stomach turned in an instant.
"The planet of New Krypton has been established and I was under the impression that Superman and Supergirl were the last of their kind, but more of these Kryptonians keep popping up," Godfrey stated in an accusatory tone of voice, almost as if he was wagging his finger at some child that had been caught with their hand in the cookie jar. "I must ask you people if it is fair that the people of the world are subjugated to these lies, and most importantly, this planet who is set up as an outpost that has weapons that can fire right at us."
Kara stood up straight, angrily.
"Who is feeding him his lies?" Kara asked hotly.
"Well we do have a War World parked outside," Faora offered, who was half tempted to fly it over to Earth and blow up Godfrey's transmission tower, even though that would cause some collateral damage. Plus she reminded herself that the consequences would cause even more damage.
Harry sighed, turning his head around, he knew that there were going to people who questioned this. That was why he wanted to keep New Krypton a secret, but that secret was thrown out for consumption by the Reach. It was a purely spiteful action and one that Harry found himself rather annoyed by on general principle to be honest. He cracked his knuckles and waited for the Reach, waited to see what they were going to do.
"So they've presented themselves as the heroes."
"Common tactic of war, but not one that they're going to get away with," Faora responded as Kara nodded.
Kara, Karen, Harry, and Faora were going to take a trip to Earth, whilst the others held down the fort on New Krypton.
X-X-X
"What I want to know is what the Reach is trying to gain?"
That question was brought up by Flash and it was a good question. The fastest man alive might have been a joker but he knew when it was time to step back and be completely serious. He watched the entire assembled Justice League.
"The Reach, they're….known throughout history, destroyer of many planets," Booster Gold stated, his knowledge of the future being invaluable as he kept his eyes on the League.
"That's about right and by your word, they are only going to get worse," Hal added as he sighed deeply.
Batman was quiet and he watched them.
"Did you see who was standing next to them in the press conference?" Batman asked, trying to keep his voice Batman-like.
"We all know," Superman responded, giving Dick a warning look, since Bruce was not here to do it. Although he did visit his friend the other way and the physical therapy was going well, although not as well as Batman would have liked it to go. He was a bit of a perfectionist, no two ways about it.
Dick thought about all of the times he went around with Slade, and his taunting voice rang through out all of his ears.
"I wish for all of the heroes to comply with this act, and hope that we can work together to achieve a brand new tomorrow. Especially Batman, I'm especially looking forward to watching as he reveals his identity to the world."
The Vigilante Registration Act was passed and all super heroes would have to unmask and make their identities public record.
"Do you think that the Reach is working with Slade?" Black Canary asked.
Superman was the one who answered that question. "I don't know, there's some other common factor between them that I can't place."
"There may be at third party," the Martin Manhunter offered as he stared forward in a stoic manner.
"Things are going to get worse, there's a full scale witch hunt going on," Flash stated but Tonks, or now Mimic, stared at him in an exasperated expression. Zatanna even rolled her eyes at that one. "No offense meant."
"None really taken but none of the witch hunts had any real witches burned, just innocent people burned," Tonks responded tensely.
Roy Harper, the new Green Arrow as Oliver was on his extended sabbatical, sat there and watched them through narrowed eyes. "Do you think that this will turn out like this?"
"I wouldn't be surprised," Huntress offered but the Question responded in a crisp tone of voice.
"It is not who they are working with, but rather who they aren't working with, because there are many people who are willing to throw their hats into the ring to achieve their victory. I feel that the Reach may be the nexus point of a wider conspiracy."
The Justice League nodded, the Question might have been a kook but there were more than a few times where he was on to something and this might have been one of those times.
Down a level below them, Harry returned, with Hermione turning towards him with a smile. Claire and Barbara were there as well.
"It's been too long, Harry," Barbara responded as she greeted her friend, blushing slightly at the contact when they hugged but she quickly fixed her face into a stoic and business like expression that only could be taught by Batman before Harry could notice.
"Well when New Krypton has been outed, you figure that there's a reason to come back, and….I don't suppose that we could tell them that we don't intend to blow up Earth with weapons," Harry remarked but Claire snorted.
"Hardly, I think that they expect you to roll over like a good dog and allow Earth to put an embassy up there and perhaps an army where they can police the people of New Krypton," Claire commented and Harry watched her with a raised eyebrow. "That's what Godfrey says you should do to prove that you're sincere."
"Well that's not about to happen," Faora said, insulted that weasel would even suggest such a thing, as she stepped up and Hermione watched her with a smile.
"Harry's told me of the great work that you've done, making the most out of New Krypton," Hermione remarked before her voice dropped to be a little bit more serious. "Is there any luck trying to find any other survivors that might have colonized before the destruction of Krypton?"
"Not such no but I have a feeling that they have their own lives," Faora said as Kara showed up, and M'Gann, Artemis, Blue Beetle, Beast Boy, Cassie, and Robin all turned up with them. "Oh good, our little group is here."
"Wait, we actually have a mission," Cassie stated in an excited voice, but Hermione gave her a stern expression which made her fall back into line. She clasped her hand to her mouth and took a deep breath. "Right, right, sorry, sorry."
The truth was that Cassie was a slight bit nervous; she wanted to make the best out of the situation she had been put in. The codename of Wondergirl was a huge responsibility that she wanted to live up to. The original gifted her the bracelets and Cassie was determined not to let them down at all.
"Yes, a mission," Kara responded with a bright smile on her face. Karen was doing some preliminary work and would be able to set up the mission.
"First time, nice chance to get my feet wet, I guess," Cassie said excitedly as she watched them, with a smile crossing her face.
"Well with any luck, we won't run into any trouble," Harry commented and Artemis and Barbara both snickered and even Faora cracked a smile. "Right, I forgot, we're dealing with the super hero business, where luck is not something that any of us can afford at all."
"So, before we go, I need to introduce you to the newest member of our team," Hermione stated as she closed her eyes and sighed. "It was a sad day when the old Blue Beetle left us, Ted Kord was a great man and….well he will be missed."
"Foul play is suspected in the lab accident that consumed him," Barbara added, although they had their own theories. Bruce, who still played detective even while on his back, stated at the Reach might have something to do with this. "And that brings us to our newest recruit, the new Blue Beetle."
"Pleasure to meet you," the new Blue Beetle stated, with the hints of a Hispanic accent present as he reached forward and shook Harry's hand.
"The pleasure is all mine," Harry commented.
Less than two months ago, Jaime Reyes was a mild mannered lab assistant to Ted Kord, just trying to scrape together a living to go through college. Then there was an accident that caused Kord's death, some would say murder, and he wondered if those people were too far off the mark when they talked about the murder of Ted Kord.
Still the fact of the matter was that one of Kord's prizes possessions, his Scarab, latched to Jaime and gave him powers. The scarab had super natural origins.
'You do realize that is one of the Reach devices, like Black Beetle had,' Kara thought to Harry as she watched the device.
'Yes, I know,' Harry responded before he added. 'And you do realize that there is a chance that they could use it to take control of his body and mind if they figure out a way to….how did they put it, get it on mode?'
'Yes, I realize that as well,' Kara added to Harry through the mental link.
Hermione cleared her throat, she hated when those two did the mental relay thing, it left her shockingly out of the loop. Cassie, Barbara, and Claire all had various degrees of amusement on the stern and frustrated expression that crossed Hermione's face.
"So we're going to take a look at this Reach facility?"
Harry smiled, as always they had a plan and they hope that plan would work out rather well.
X-X-X
Sometimes the best laid plans often took a turn for the rather ugly and Harry prepared for that. The young team of heroes stepped forward, with M'Gann keeping them all linked up mentally. It would be unwise to use any other communication that could be intercepted and the wizard's face twisted into a grimace as he half expected this plan to go badly.
'So far so good,' Harry thought to them all, as he stood with Kara, the two of them hovering in the air, with Karen standing behind them. They shifted in the air, bending into the darkness and hoping that they could not be seen.
'Don't count your chickens before they hatch, the night is still young,' Barbara thought to them through the mental link that Miss Martian established.
'Right, Batgirl, you and Robin go in, take Wondergirl, Volcana and Miss Martian, you've got that side entrance,' Harry thought through the mental link. 'Artemis, take that vent to the side, Beetle cover her.'
'Got it.'
'Got it.'
'Right.'
'Gotcha.'
'I'm seeing a few weird energy readings here,' Hermione thought through the mental link that had been put up and she bit down on her lip, offering a slight frown as she did. She double checked the energy readings but certainly they could not be right. Yet the damning and rather obvious proof stared at her right in front of her face, about to smack her straight in the face. 'Actually….no…no.'
'What, spit it out, Hermione,' Harry thought to her.
'Energy readings, like nothing I've ever seen before, and….well actually it's pretty similar to something that I've seen before but it's kind of like…nuclear energy you know,' Hermione thought to them through the link. 'And it's being pumped in, that's their so called peace embassy, they are trying to tap into the nuclear plants.'
'Wonderful,' Harry thought as the group moved in.
Volcana was the one that moved in slightly, as she locked eyes with Omega and Flamebird, or rather Harry and Kara. The two of them stepped forward, waiting for an instant, and craning their ears, trying to hear what was going on around them. There was a humming.
'I hear life forms,' M'Gann thought.
Those life forms, as they were, they were not friendly.
They were drones, beetles, and they were mindless thugs, complete puppets of the reach.
Blue Beetle stood there, his scarab going wild.
'Jaime Reyes, you must annihilate them with extreme prejudice, take no prisoners,' the scarab told him in a blood thirsty tone of voice.
'I don't know, I mean there's living people in there, what if…'
'The meat inside the shells is no longer alive, they haven't been for some time,' the scarab argued. 'They are completely on mode and we must…I hear them calling out to us, if they capture us, they can put this unit on mode as well.'
"Okay, okay, fine!" Blue Beetle yelled as he turned around which caused Robin to give him a weird look as he yelled out loud.
'And they can't hear our communications through the link,' Blue Beetle stated, which made him look insane. He saw Artemis use an arrow to knock out one set of enemies and the electrified pulse knocked them down.
Miss Martian popped from underneath the ground and knocked one of the enemies down but they blasted her back. She flew backwards and bounced back up just as quickly as she landed. Annoyed, Miss Martian closed her eyes which than began to glow and she caused them to get knocked back.
"How many of these…." Miss Martian stated but she was knocked head over heels. Omega flew over and caught her in his arms. She smiled. "Thanks."
"No problem, but our work is far from down," Omega stated as Flamebird flashed out of the way of two of the drones, which caused them to knock each other out.
'Nice one Kara, set them up and we'll knock them down,' Harry thought to her and Power Girl flew forward, before sending heat vision flying towards one of her enemies.
'Well they seem to be particularly vulnerable to heat vision,' Karen thought to her spouses.
Volcana smiled, if they were vulnerable to heat vision, they were also resistant to other things that had to do with fire. She closed her eyes and caused the flames to kick up around her. She maneuvered the flames and chased down an enemy with a dragon that fired flames towards her enemies. The drones backed off as she continued to back them up.
"Get through the door!" Robin yelled as he flung the smoke pellets down to the ground and there was a cloud of smoke that gagged them. The Boy Wonder pushed his way through the crowd and tried to get through there.
"On it," Wondergirl stated, as the blonde ripped the door off of the hinges.
She went flying backwards and flew down to the ground. A large and beefed on individual stepped forwards, raising his hands and giving a loud grow.
Miss Martian blocked his fist as Batgirl tried to blind him with a flash bang but she was knocked backwards.
'Who is that?' Omega thought through the link as he tried to knock the enemy back but the armor caused his magic bounce off. Which mean that he would have to try harder, and blast them much harder. He closed his hand and drew it back.
He fired a bolt of energy from his hand and knocked the enemies back. They slid across the ground and there was a crack that signified an impact. One of the drones remained on its feet.
Blue Beetle armed the cannon.
'You sure this would work?' the youth asked from behind the connection with his scarab, watching as Wondergirl's rather passionate attempts to take down one of the scarab drones was brought down.
'You need to focus on what needs to happen and worry about any collateral damage when you have defeated the enemy.'
Blue Beetle aimed a shot and knocked them for a loop, causing them to land on the ground. There was a huge explosion as they fizzled out with a crack.
"Got it!" Flamebird yelled as she grabbed hands with Omega and the married couple unleashed the full scope of their powers, locking onto Power Girl, and the trio closed their eyes, tapping into the energies.
Boom!
BOOM!
That was the sound of several enemies going up in flames, none of them being able to function after they were nailed hard.
"Okay, through this door we have…." Robin stated as he opened the door and his eyes widened. "Canisters and canisters of fruit juice?"
Kara could have cursed to the heavens, there had to be something else down here, they did not come all of this way for fucking fruit juice. There had to be something but the pitter patter of security could be heard.
Harry extracted the necessary example from the canister, he had a feeling that there was more to this than meets the eye.
"We need to get out of here, we can't be seen around her," Harry responded, as Flamebird and Power Girl destroyed the security tapes, before bolting out the door.
This mission did not turn out as well as they thought that it would but on the bright side, it did not turn out as badly as they thought it would either. So it was a fifty-fifty shot that something turned out well.
X-X-X
Patronus Incorporated main labs saw Harry standing over a table, trying to figure out what was inside the juice extract.
"I hate to say this, but thank God my shift's over," Lana said as she showed up, feeling a bit frazzled but then she watched Harry, staring at the readings from the fruit juice that he extracted. "Harry….you've been staring at that for eighteen hours."
"Nineteen actually, but I'm about as baffled as he is," Hermione corrected absent mindedly as she took a careful look at the readings that had been spat out. The symbols meant something, she was almost sure of it but what did those symbols mean? Hermione frowned as she read them over, keeping a close watch on them.
"Maybe you should get some sleep, figure it out in the morning?" Lana asked, stepping forward, a concerned look in her eyes.
"Yeah, told him that about three hours ago, no dice," Hermione replied as Harry continued to watch the symbols on the piece of paper that formed.
When Hermione thought that someone was too obsessed with work, there was a problem.
There was something in this juice and it was not the daily recommended serving of vitamins. The small sample he extracted, if he could reverse engineer it somehow, he could figure out what was in the juice.
"Another doomed operation by the Justice League, trying to think that they are something, despite their actions being illegal."
'Oh for fuck's sake,' Harry thought to himself, after the all nighter and most of the day he pulled, he was not in the mood to listen to G. Gordon Godfrey.
"Sorry Harry, but it's important to know what the enemy is saying."
Faora turned up, maybe she had been here the entire time, maybe she had not, Harry had no idea. All he knew was that that the obnoxious voice of G. Gordon Godfrey was drumming into his ear drums.
"A peaceful embassy for the Reach was turned into disaster when the League and their little teen soldiers decided to crash the party. Leading the charge is Harry Potter, the so called fearless leader of New Krypton and his wife Kara. Or as you may know them as, Arcane and Supergirl."
Their secret identities weren't really too secret.
"Or would you prefer them to be known as Omega and Flamebird?"
Godfrey let those words sink in.
"Whatever the message was, those words stay the same. They are trying to undermine the law of the land and trying to make sure that they are above us all. They sit on New Krypton, waiting to lead an invasion force, with weapons pointed at Earth."
Harry sighed, let the people think what they want to think.
"And what's this….Harry Potter comes from a secret society of magic users that remained hidden from us for years. That became exempt from all laws because they were too high and mighty to be above the normal man. I tell you, what is their game? What is their motivation? What are they doing? This group has attacked those who cannot defend themselves, wiped memories, and used magic to bewitch the mind and ensnare the senses. Plus when you consider his murder of countless people, perhaps one could see Harry Potter thinking he above the law. He has no empathy for those other than him, his solution to all of the problems of the world is kill all of the people who disagree with him."
'You're still alive, aren't you?' Harry asked.
"Shut that off, please," Kara demanded as she walked forward and sat down next to Harry. "Any luck?"
Harry's eyes looked at her, nearly bloodshot and it was a pretty awful sight to see how hard he had been pounding away the midnight oils to try to get this done.
"Oh, that doesn't look good at all," Kara commented as she watched her husband tensely. "The Justice League managed to extract samples themselves as well but they're no closer to figuring out what's in them."
Harry was afraid of that, there was one missing piece of this puzzle that he could not determine. The green eyed sorcerer thought that there was some element, something, anything, that he could have figured out. He allowed himself to think about it.
"So how long are you going to stay here?" Hermione asked to Harry.
That was a good question and one that Harry did not in fact have an answer to it, so he kept his head inclined. There was time that ran by, like seconds on a clock before he offered what passed as an answer to Hermione. He was uncertain if it was it was considered a good one.
"As long as it takes to figure out what the Reach is up to, and I don't even know how long that would be," Harry admitted to Hermione and the brunette witch inclined her head for a brief moment.
There were more questions than there were answers and those answers really took a little bit for Harry to figure out. The young wizard felt like everything that he was doing was being demeaned somehow and the people lost their trust in them, lost their trust in the heroes that were in the world.
The problem was that Harry could not help but think that some of these people had points that perhaps the heroes should be feared. It was not a cut and dry situation, one could go back and forth about everything and all would have good points and bad points. Along with points that would be somewhere in the middle with those points.
Now it was time to keep burning those midnight oils.
X-X-X
"Wish we could say that we're closer to figuring out what was there, but you know, we're not really getting all that close," Wally remarked as he tried to take a crack at it. His knowledge of chemistry proved to be a pretty useful resource but this little cocktail him bamboozled and fairly confused.
"That's the thing, there should be something, anything in here that would solve the puzzle, but nothing," Harry said as he grabbed Kara's hand.
Pamela's face crossed into a frown as she analyzed the sample.
"Maybe it's just fruit juice?" Pamela asked, and given what she was up to, she should know about the chemical extracts that were in there. She tapped her fingers on the table, nervously drumming but there was no thought.
'Maybe it is,' Harry thought to himself.
"And maybe the Reach are playing a game," Tonks suggested as she placed a hand to her forehead. "Just stop and think about it, they might have been leading you onto that place, so you would come across it. They could claim that what they were doing, to give you the added nutrients."
"I don't know, all of those nutrients could be very addictive," Kara suggested off hand and it hit Harry across the back of the head quickly. He could not believe that he did not figure out the common factor before.
"That's it," Harry responded as he clutched Kara's hand tightly and she looked baffled.
Kara wasn't the only one who looked baffled; Wally also raised an eyebrow and looked rather curious.
"What's it?"
"There's nothing….particularly lethal in the fruit drinks, but there's something in it that makes it addictive," Harry stated as he figured out what the Reach's game was. "I think that there plan might be to get the people addicted to the fruit drink for months and once it floods the market, they can switch it out for their real plan."
"That's actually clever," Kara stated as she closed her eyes, crossing her arms at the thought.
The Reach figured out how to do something that no one would see coming.
"You know what the worst part of this was," Tonks responded as she watched everyone and they shrugged. "The Question was right about the conspiracy theory part, I can't believe it, can you?"
Harry had to admit that he could not really believe it but now that raised some extremely interesting questions about what the game of the Reach was. They were playing with a deck that was rather skewed towards one side or the other and then there was the fact of their mysterious partner, which Harry figured might not be so mysterious as he thought about it.
"There was one thing that I noticed there," Harry commented after he paused for a few seconds and the entire group's attention was on him. He smiled, realizing that he had the full attention of everyone there. "And I might be completely off balance but the Reach is not working alone. There is some design on the technology, that comes straight from Apokolips."
That little statement caused everyone to stand up on end, the games had gotten even more dangerous, not that they weren't already dangerous before but the danger doubled, perhaps even tripled after hearing that statement. They knew what Apoklips meant and it meant facing a threat that perhaps the Justice League might not be completely ready to face.
Yet there was one more thing that none of them could figure out.
Why was he of all people helping the Reach?
There was some huge piece missing in that huge puzzle. A common thread between the two of them and Harry tried to mull over the matter in his mind. There were dozens of potential explanations and none of them would come close to accurate.
Harry stepped into the next room, with Kara following him.
In the next room, they saw it, they saw the ship, he nearly forgot about it in the insanity. Two of the three keys were found, with a third one hidden somewhere.
Was that what Darkseid was after?
Kara, Karen, Harry, and Faora would take the portal back to New Krypton tonight, but they had a lot to think about.
X-X-X
"So today's venture was what we would call a complete success, gentlemen," Slade concluded as he held up a drink, basking in the moment of what he would call a victory, with his new friends the Reach.
"The Justice League is quite quick to jump to conclusions," the Reach ambassador stated as he watched them.
"Earth will secure New Krypton for us and then we will pick up the pieces of both worlds," the other member of the Reach responded.
"And the spoils of war will be ours," Slade commented as he tapped on the side of his glass.
The truth was there was nothing personal in this little venture with the Reach, well not entirely, this was merely business and it could be a nasty business. Slade had been going around with heroes for a while and now he was paid to make sure they were humiliated.
Sometimes a pencil was merely a pencil and sometimes fruit juice was merely fruit juice. The Reach had the best of intentions in mind, Slade would make sure of that. People feared those who put their necks foolishly on the line to save them.
"So begins a new partnership, cheers," Slade stated in a voice that was creepy and menacing all together.
"Yes, so begins," the robed figure known as Desaad concluded.
To Be Continued in the Next Arc "Chaos of the Crime Syndicate."
